William Herbert, 1st Earl of Pembroke

William Herbert was a Welsh soldier and Yorkist noble who became the first holder of the Herbert earldom of Pembroke. He helped Edward IV consolidate power in Wales, but was captured after the royal defeat at Edgecote in 1469 and executed on the orders of Warwick’s faction.

William Herbert, 1st Earl of Pembroke also held the offices or ranks of count, member of the House of Lords, and High Sheriff of Somerset. William Herbert, 1st Earl of Pembroke belonged to the Herbert family and operated within Wales; Kingdom of England. William Herbert, 1st Earl of Pembroke died in Banbury.

C. F. Dunn’s Wheel of Fortune places William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, among the Yorkist magnates whose authority reaches directly into Isobel Fenton’s future when her inheritance leaves her vulnerable to wardship and an imposed marriage. As Warwick’s rebellion culminates at Edgcote in 1469, Herbert’s defeat and capture turn the wider fracture of Edward IV’s regime into an immediate threat to the local arrangements on which Isobel’s security depends.